I'm torn on (edit: more recent) Visual Kei...aside from Dir en Grey (who, as you said, add prog elements) it all sounds exactly the same, and most of it is boring. However, I love the "base" sound, so the bands that get it right (like Gazette) I can really get behind. Other imitators (Diaura) might have a decent song or two mixed in with the sea of mediocrity.

The last three Gazette albums all sounded EXACTLY the same, so I was hoping that going a year without a release would invigorate them a bit...but from the sound of this review, that's not the case.

I'll have to check it out on my own. Gazette are easily one of the best bands to do this style.

Album Rating: 2.0

"I'm torn on Visual Kei...aside from Dir en Grey (who, as you said, add prog elements) it all sounds exactly the same, and most of it is boring..."



Check:

X Japan

Luna Sea

BUCK-TICK

Plastic Tree

Nightmare

Malice Mizer

Lareine

Versailles

Kamaitachi

Anti Feminism

(Early) L'arc-en-Ciel

(Early) SID

Mucc

Kuroyume



I should actually do a proper vk list one day.

Err, I should have specified more recent visual kei. Such as: -OZ-, Alice Nine, Exist+trace, all of the bands listed in the review. 3/4 of the bands on that list I like the other 1/4 I don't know (so i'll have to check them out)

Album Rating: 2.0

Ah, that makes more sense then. I usually call the newer guys neo visual-kei for that reason. I remember listening to an -OZ- album once and I hated it.

I like -OZ-, but probably because they're one of the first bands in the style I heard.

The DEG comparisons seem kind of off-beat to me. Even on their most monotonous albums DEG had a few tricks up their sleeves to make their sound stand out, and further they got the more creative they've become.

Album Rating: 2.0

fair enough.

Album Rating: 2.0

That is exactly my point, I was unaware that it didn't come across very well. Basically what I was implying is that most of these post 2000 visual-kei outfits are trying to emulate them, especially these guys. I never implyed Dir En Grey were terrible, I do have a soft spot for them, I was implying that this plethora of bands copying them are bad. I have a DeG album 5'd come on man.

Album Rating: 3.0 | Sound Off

While you two are on the subject of neo-visual kei, I don't think I've ever come across an act that made me more agitated than either Vistlip or Mejibray. Fuck that noise to the extreme.

Album Rating: 2.5

Mejibray ewwwwwwwwww. The sooner VK stops trying to be Diru-light the better, they completely miss what makes them so special.

Album Rating: 2.0

Vistlip and Mejibray are awful. Though at least in Vistlip's case Order Made is a pretty catchy song.

My girlfriend listens to a lot of jrock so I inevitably hear a good bit of it and while it's not a genre I particularly care about, I can tell you gazette doesn't straight up copy dir en grey. Sure, there are plenty of similarities as is to be the case with 2 bands in the same very specific genre but eh, it's a reach to say they are straight up lifting stuff out of dir en grey songs.

If anything I think the bands in this scene get heavy inspiration from each other and it bleeds over a lot. Which is sort of like copying, but it's not. Could/should there be a lot more originality in this scene though? Absolutely. No arguments there.

Even though a lot of these bands do sound freakishly similar...none of them are as bad as Sadie

hey hey hey, I actually really really liked Madrigal de Maria........

double post

Album Rating: 2.0

Sadie have a song that's almost exactly Rosier by Luna Sea so yeah they're terrible in more ways than one.

dude do u listen to anything that isnt over the top japanese or korean metal or pop bullshit?

japanese alt rock sucks

Album Rating: 2.0

dude do u listen to anything that isnt over the top japanese or korean metal or pop bullshit?

do u rly need to ask

Album Rating: 2.0

Well I was just making sure cause I didn't want to be jumping to conclusions but sure.



The answer is: of course I listen to other stuff, why wouldn't I?



I'm not familiar with any artists from Korea, but a lot of my favourite bands are from Japan yeah. One of the first bands that really made me start broadening my horizons outside of radio metal and Nirvana and all that were a visual-kei band from Japan called Nightmare. Since I liked them so much (and still do) I naturally started searching for artists similar to them and from there I kept finding stuff outside the visual-kei niche through websites, youtube and obviously anime. Then I found friends here with similar taste like CalculatingInfinity who really likes X Japan and Versailles etc etc and people like Discovolante who has almost an obsession with artists from Japan. So since I've been introduced to so much of it and since it's its own niche, very misinformed, part of the internet that no one actually goes into a lot of great detail about (in english anyway), I like to review them here, where not a lot of people know about these bands and would probably other wise not be interested in finding out about them.



and of course whether or not the stuff I listen to is bullshit or not is down to opinion.



If that makes any sense or w/e



anyway, something like that.